What should I use to build my site?

[Disasterpieces]

Hi, I'm new to site building and only know little about code. My goal is to have a site that can be used as a resource for people looking to lose weight, and I was simply wondering what sort of software I should use to achieve this.

I'd like something that I can simply generate a home page that shows my latest articles (blog posts I guess), links atop the page, obviously a header and that, navigation etc. I'd also like to have menus down a side with headers like "recommended products" and "recommended articles" etc. I guess for a recommended product in that section I could write a blog post about a product and make a link to that blog entry? I'd also like to compare products, and have information on the home page that doesn't appear elsewhere. A shop option for people that may want to purchase ebooks and other things would be nice, too.

What can do all this for me? I'm not sure if its asking a lot, but I need something that won't confuse the crap out of me.. To be honest, I found using Drupal very difficult. Can you create professional looking websites using Wordpress? I've read good things about it and was wondering if that was maybe the best option for me? Is it easy to use?

Opinions and help on this matter would be greatly appreciated! :)

[Chella]

Absolutely, you can create professional looking websites using Wordpress. There are also free business templates available for download that you can apply to your Wordpress installation. (Or hire someone to create one for you.)

There are other CMS (Content Management Systems) available that would produce what you're looking for; however, I believe Wordpress would accomplish all you're trying to do. I use Wordpress for my studio website, so I can't speak for other CMS/Blog software.

[shadmego]

I have a demo site where you can personally interact with various software that will accomplish what you are after.

demos.4christministry.org.

As far as what Chella was talking about, Wordpress seems a very popular software package and should be able to handle everything you are looking for, but there is another system that can also handle everything. Joomla!. There are various addons that can provide a "shop" for selling your books and like Wordpress, you can have different modules on various pages that provide targeted information about your site and its articles.

Don't worry about messing anything up on the demo site. Everything resets after 60 minutes.

~regards, and welcome to the community

[margaret]

Use wordpress to easily create your website/blog. http://imagges.freehostia.com/p.jpg

[Disasterpieces]

Thanks heaps for the advice!

shadmego, that demo site was very helpful, thank you. Now you've got me in a situation where I can't choose between Joomla and Wordpress, both seemed to have the ability to do what I wanted them to do when I tested them out on your site.

I think I may just go with Wordpress, it seems to be a popular choice and it also seems simple enough to use. Still not 100% sure though. I'll try and make my mind up by later tonight - thanks again!

Edit - I've installed Wordpress :)

[davidb3212]

I am using the hostmonster pagebuilder for my website. However, I want to start up a new site that has an easy to use layout, similar to hostmonsters, but I want to be able to add <div> html codes as well as javascript htmls. Anyone know of a pagebuilder I can use that will allow me to use these?

[Falcon1986]

If you need to edit code then either use the File Manager's built-in text editor or whichever editor you use on your computer. Just make sure that formatting is not applied.